Word Origin & History

slight from an O.Scand. source akin to O.N. slettr "smooth, sleek," from P.Gmc. *slikhtaz (cf. O.S. slicht; Low Ger. slicht "smooth, plain common;" O.E. -sliht "level," attested in eorðslihtes "level with the ground;" O.Fris. sliucht, M.Du. sleht, O.H.G. sleht, Goth. slaihts "smooth"), probably from a collateral form of PIE base *sleig- "to smooth, glide." Sense evolution is from "level" to "smooth, sleek" (c.1300), to "slender, weak" (1393), to "trifling, inferior" (1548). The verb sense of "treat with indifference" is first recorded 1597, from the adj. sense of "having little worth." Sense ...of Ger. cognate schlecht developed from "smooth, plain, simple" to "bad," and as it did it was replaced in the original senses by schlicht, a back-formation from schlichten "to smooth, to plane," a derivative of schlecht in the old sense.